High-speed rotary cutting of difficult-to-cut materials on multitasking lathe

This paper aims to realize the high-speed rotary dry cutting of an Inconel 718 at 500 m/min on a multitasking lathe which has an additional milling spindle with an X/Y/Z-axis and inclination control. A series of experiments were conducted and are discussed with respect to the tool face temperature analysis by FEM. It was verified that it is necessary to select an optimum inclination angle, tool rotation speed and tool diameter so as to enable the main cutting force direction to align with the highest rigidity direction of an applied rotary tool. Under preferable cutting conditions, the average tool rake face temperature measured by a thermograph camera was about 300 °C even at a high cutting speed of 500 m/min under dry cutting conditions, and the tool wear decreased dramatically compared with the conventional tools.